Produced by StevenGibbs, Christoph W. Kluge, Charlene Taylor and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.)
Obvious typographical and printing errors have been corrected. Variations in hyphenation have been normalized; other spelling inconsistencies have been retained.
Additional notes and details of the corrections can be found at the end of this e-text.
EXTRACTED FROM DOCUMENTS IN THE FRENCH ARCHIVES.
LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET MDCCCXXVI.
LONDON: PRINTED BY S. AND R. BENTLEY, DORSET STREET.
I was led to undertake the following Narrative by the perusal of a work, lately published at Paris, entitled "Histoire de L'Homme au Masque de Fer, par J. Delort;" in which the name of that state prisoner is most clearly and satisfactorily ascertained, by means of authentic documents.
Under these circumstances, it may be asked why I was not contented to leave the question, thus set at rest, in the hands of M. Delort, who had the original merit of the discovery:--to this I would answer, that M. Delort's part of the book struck me as peculiarly ill arranged and confused; besides being unnecessarily filled with the most fulsome flattery of Lewis the Fourteenth, never, certainly, more inappropriately bestowed, than while in the act of recording one of the most cruel and oppressive acts of that Sovereign's cruel and oppressive reign.
I have also thought, that the subject was one of sufficient historical curiosity to interest the English public.
For these reasons, I have been induced to throw together the following chain of evidence upon the subject, making use of the same documents as M. Delort, to which I have added some others previously published, and printing the whole series in an Appendix.
No. 1. Estrades to Lewis the Fourteenth. Commencement of the Negociation.--State of the Court of Mantua.--Influence of the Spaniards there 89
No. 2. Matthioli to Lewis the Fourteenth. Protestations of devotion to Lewis.--Belief in the good intentions of the Duke of Mantua 101
No. 3. Estrades to Pomponne. Continuation of the negociation.--Intrigues of the Austrian Party 104